


leaving these broken pieces behind you

by frankchurchillsaysrelax



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Gen, If You Squint - Freeform, Kara Danvers & Winn Schott Jr. Friendship, Minor Character Death, Minor Mon-El/Winn Schott Jr., Toyman (mentioned), angst and friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-05
Updated: 2017-02-05
Packaged: 2018-09-22 06:17:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9587855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frankchurchillsaysrelax/pseuds/frankchurchillsaysrelax
Summary: Winn gets some unexpected news about his father that sends him into an emotional tailspin. Luckily, he has the Super Friends to help get him through it.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Here is my first attempt at writing for the Supergirl fandom. I don’t know if it’s any good but I’m pretty proud of it. I originally posted it on tumblr but I'm hoping it might get some more traction over here.
> 
> This story does contain a minor character’s death but is mostly just 2500 words of Winn-centric angst with the tiniest bit of Monwinn thrown in because I’m weak and literally can’t help myself.

_“Winslow Schott Sr., aka the Toyman, was found guilty today for his acts of terror on the city last year. Previously serving a life sentence, Schott has now received the death penalty and is scheduled to be executed by way of lethal injection later this month. Family members of his original victims declined to comment and….”_

Winn didn’t hear any more as he quickly made his way out of the cafe, forgetting all about his coffee and the donuts he’d promised to bring Kara. He doubted that anyone there even knew who he was, but it still felt like all eyes were on him.

Had he known what was happening in a courtroom on the other side of the city, he would have never left his apartment this morning.

He’d wanted nothing to do with the trial. Agent Chase had promised him that he wouldn’t have to testify, and so he’d pushed it all from his mind. He’d tried to anyway.

* * *

 

Numbly walking into the DEO he knows he’s not imagining the stares any longer. People here know his name and oh how he wishes he could go back to the days of being the invisible tech guy. Before he can reach his desk he hears someone calling his name and the attention it draws makes his skin itch and his throat tighten.

“Winn! Are you alright? We heard–”

“I’m fine Kara, honestly.” His smile is too wide, his cheerfulness is too fake. He doesn’t care.

“But Winn–”

“I said I’m _fine_ ,” he shouts.

Kara’s eyes widen briefly before a look of hurt passes over her features. Again, he can’t really bring himself to care.

“Sorry,” he offers halfheartedly, “but I really need you to drop it.”

Kara goes to speak again, but Alex stops her with a hand on her arm as she walks up to them.

“Winn, why don’t you go home for today. That wasn’t a suggestion,” she adds before he can argue. “We’ll call you in if anything major comes up, but otherwise we don’t need you here being distracted.” Her voice carries all the authority of an Assistant Director, but her eyes hold that same soft Danvers concern he’s used to only seeing from Kara.

Grabbing his bag he walks back out without a word.

* * *

 

“Whiskey and make it a double.”

“Sure thing buddy!”

On some level Winn can see that Mon-El has gotten better at his job; he doesn’t even need to check the labels before grabbing the right bottle anymore. Normally Winn would feel proud of his sort-of friend but today he feels nothing. Or he feels too much, he’s not sure. The numb feeling had begun to subside on his walk over. He’s hoping the alcohol will help fix that.

Mon-El sets the shot glass in front of him and Winn knocks it back quickly before motioning for the Daxamite to pour him another. The bar is practically empty at this time of day and the other man stands back and watches with his usual charming smirk as Winn downs the second drink just as fast. Mon-El asks what brings him in this early, but he ignores him and the alien begins to ramble about his morning and the other patrons he’s served.

Winn’s not sure if he hasn’t heard the news or if he just doesn’t care. It could go either way with Mon-El. He grunts in response to the alien’s continued gossip and motions for him to pour a third shot.

Mon-El does so, but he watches him down it with a furrowed brow that on a normal day Winn would find cute. He asks for a beer and Mon-El sets it down before walking off to busy himself with something else, and Winn cares about his disappearance more that he’d like to.

* * *

 

He’s been at the bar for several hours and Mon-El has given him several more drinks without a word. Winn doesn’t notice when the alien slips out to make a phone call or when someone sits down on the bar stool next to him until they put a hand on his shoulder.

“Winn?”

He turns to stare at Kara for a moment before falling clumsily forward to rest his forehead on her shoulder. “I’m not fine,” he whispers brokenly.

“I know,” she replies. She wraps her arms around him in a tight hug and he both loves and hates that he can feel it.

* * *

 

When he wakes up in the morning there is a blissful few seconds where he doesn’t remember the events of the day before. Then, with the pain of his hangover it all comes rushing back.

He’s not in his bed but sprawled face down on Kara’s couch. The ridiculous amount of natural light that falls into her loft is blinding him and he gropes around for something to cover his head.

“Good morning.” Her voice is softer than the harsh knock of a mug against the table next to him and he’s grateful to have a best friend who knows how to control her volume.

He sits up slowly and grabs the mug, inhaling the scent deeply before taking a sip. Kara sits next to him on the couch and nervously adjusts her glasses.

“What can I do?” she eventually asks. The crinkle in her forehead is out in full force and he focuses on it as he thinks.

“Just be here, I guess?” It comes out as a question because he _doesn’t know_ what he needs right now. He does know that he doesn’t want to push her away again though.

“Always,” she answers, although it wasn’t necessary. He already knows she’s not going anywhere.

* * *

 

“Winn are we not even going to discuss this?”

“There isn’t anything to discuss. It’s my decision and I’m not going,” he sighs. “I’m not going to the execution, and I’m sure as hell not going to see him beforehand.” He turns back to the monitors at his desk with an air of finality, but of course she doesn’t let it go.

“Don’t you want to say goodbye?” Kara leans against the desk, crosses her arms across her chest, and tilts her head to the side like she’s trying to read him.

He attempts to ignore her and focus on the schematics he’d been studying before she’d ambushed him, but her words ring in his ears.

He’d never gotten to say goodbye to his father; he’d never even really noticed when he disappeared. One morning his dad was there and the next thing he knew there was an unrecognizable monster in his place being dragged into jail. He’d never seen his father again and after last year he knew that he didn’t even exist anymore.

Winn angles his chair so he’s facing her head on. He tries to find the words to explain it to her and finally comes up with a pathetically simple, “No.”

* * *

 

“Why did you keep your name?” Mon-El asks. He’s at the bar again, but this time he’s sticking to club soda.

“Huh?” is his eloquent response.

The other man motions vaguely towards where Kara is standing watching Alex and Maggie play pool. “Kara told me you have the same name as your father and that it draws tension to you.”

“Attention,” Winn corrects.

The Daxamite nods before continuing, “She also said that your mother left you and you were given a new family. So why did you keep your name?”

Winn makes a mental note to talk to Kara about private information. Specifically that it is not to be shared with the hot alien frat boy he barely knows.

He can feel Mon-El’s eyes on him as he stares down into his glass and decides he needs something stronger for this conversation. Mon-El looks hesitant, but Winn promises to limit himself to one beer.

“I stayed with a lot of different families after my mom left,” he begins once he’s had a few sips of the alcohol, “but none of them really wanted to keep me so I wasn’t given a chance to change my name while I was in the system.”

Mon-El’s brow furrows and Winn definitely finds it cute this time.

“Why don’t you change it now?” The alien leans his forearms against the bar and his face is suddenly a lot closer. Winn’s not sure if it’s that or the beer taking quick effect that is making him feel lightheaded.

He sits back and drinks nearly half the bottle at once. “Why did you decide to go by Mon-El instead of using the name Kara gave you?” he eventually asks after a few moments of intense staring.

“Because it’s who I am, it’s the name I was given by my people and it’s a way for me to remember them by,” Mon-El says passionately.

Winn tips the bottle in the alien’s direction and raises an eyebrow smugly. “Well, there you go.”

* * *

 

“Hello Winn,” the cheerful voice startles him. He spins around in his chair and sees Mon-El approaching his desk.

“Hey dude, what,” he pauses and scratches the back of his head, turning back to his monitors, “what are you doing here?”

Mon-El leans casually against his desk and picks up a stapler, fiddling with it and wasting staples. “I’m here to train with Kara,” he says.

It doesn’t hurt that he’s been replaced in this aspect; it makes more sense for Kara to work with him since she can spar against him safely. It’s not like he misses watching the Daxamite show off his abilities. Definitely not.

Winn grabs the stapler as the constant clicking becomes annoying and sets it back on his desk. He brushes the small piles of staples into his waste basket and glances at the alien out of the corner of his eye. He barely notices the way the other man’s muscles flex and strain against his shirt sleeves when he crosses his arms.

“Would you like to join us?”

“Joi-join, join you?” Winn clears his throat. “Join you where?”

“For training!” Mon-El grins widely and rocks back on his heels. “I know your wig is out because of your dad and I thought a good work out might help you.”

“Wigging out, I’m wigging out because of my dad,” Winn corrects, and he realizes that it’s true. Even nearly three weeks later he’s still a mess of feelings, mostly anger. Maybe a round or two against the punching bag wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

“Unless, you think you can’t keep up with us?” Mon-El’s smirk is so smug Winn is tempted to exchange the punching bag for his face, if he didn’t have to worry about breaking his hand. Instead he settles for rolling his eyes.

“I’m still human dude, by definition I can’t keep up with you.” He turns back to the monitors and locks his computer before standing. “But I’m in, let’s go.”

“Sweetness!”

* * *

 

“Winn, Winn stop! Stop it!”

Kara’s voice breaks through the haze of adrenaline he’s fallen under as she pulls him back, stopping his wild punches with her arms wrapped like a vice around his own. His breath is harsh and ragged, and his vision clears slowly, the red tint that had shadowed everything now receding.

A visibly concerned Mon-El is standing behind the punching bag to steady it. The fabric is marred with bright red streaks and Winn looks down at his shaking hands, the knuckles cracked and blood seeping through the tape he’d wrapped around them.

He doesn’t realize that he’s crying until Kara’s hold on him shifts into a comforting embrace. His tears soak through her cape as he lets out all of the emotions he’s bottled up these last few weeks. He cries for his father who died a long time ago, for his mother who’d been too weak to stay and live in her new reality, and for the little eleven year old boy who’d lost them both.

“I’ll go, but,” he looks up at Kara and Mon-El, who’d come to stand beside them, “will you come with me? Both of you,” he adds looking straight at Mon-El who looks surprised but nods right along with Kara.

* * *

 

“Maybe this was a mistake,” Winn whispers as he glances around the small room. A curtain was drawn on the other side of the large window facing the rows of seats as if they were waiting for a play to start.

“Well then let’s go. This place is a bum,” Mon-El says loudly earning him some annoyed glances from the families of the Toyman’s victims.

Kara throws the Daxamite an exasperated look before turning to her best friend. “Winn, we’ll do whatever you want. Do you want to leave?”

Before he can answer, the curtain is pulled back and the room goes silent as the prisoner is led into the room by two guards. His face is passive and he looks more like his father than when Winn last saw him; older and grayer than in his childhood memories, but with the same stoic look that he would get when he was lost in thought.

Winn sits frozen in his seat and barely reacts when Kara grabs his hand and Mon-El puts an arm around his shoulders, subtly pulling him a little closer. His eyes trace his father’s face imagining the man he could have been, committing him to memory. That’s what he was here for after all; to say goodbye, to get closure. For the first time in a long time he allows himself to wonder what kind of life he would have had if none of this had ever happened.

While he’s being strapped down and his arm is prepped for the needle, the Toyman takes his time glancing at the crowd. His eyes meet Winn’s and his emotionless features are twisted up into a sinister smile. Winn looks down at his lap, not missing the wink the monster sends him or the way the aliens on either side of him each tighten their hold protectively.

The needle is inserted. Each plunger drops. One. Two. Three. And in just a few minutes the last piece of his father is gone. Everyone stands and starts to shuffle out of the room, and he practically has to be dragged out by his friends.

Winn doesn’t get to say goodbye and he doesn’t get closure.

Once again those have been stolen from him by the same evil that stole his family nearly fifteen years ago. Once again Winn is left to deal with the mess. Walking out of the prison, one hand still in Kara’s and the other claimed by Mon-El, he knows this time he won’t have to do it alone.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked it. Maybe drop a review if you did? Validation is like candy. I shouldn't ask for it but I can't get enough.


End file.
